The
next game in the near decade old franchise comes out this coming week and until
now I’ve been rather sceptical. I loved the first three games and the world
they built but until now very little had been said or shown by the new game. So
I decided to spend £3 on EA Access for a month and play the 10 hour trial
version of the game to see how it plays and I am happy to say that thankfully
for the most part this game is great.

Characters:

Characters
are what make and break a Bioware game for me and while the initial trailers
made the squad look quite bad, in particular Miranda 2.0 and Jacob 2.0 for the
humans, after getting to know them a bit better I have to say the improvement
compared to the older games is really noticeable.

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Unlike
in the previous games where every character had a fucking sob story a mile long,
here the characters come from a diverse background whether it be wanting a
fresh start, a sense of adventure, or doing their bit. In particular the new
Turian character Vetra Nyx really stands out for me. For a series whose Turian
characters have always been rather regimented towards “duty and honour” Vetra
is pretty much the intergalactic equivalent of Del Boy, a wheeler-dealer who
knows how to get anything you need from anyone who has it.

So
far I haven’t found a single Kaiden or Jacob Taylor level pointless supporting
character thank god.

Voice
Acting:

The
performances by the voice actors go hand in hand with the characters and these
two have so far been almost without exception great. There’s a lot of variety
in tone and attitude that matches the character they’re trying to portray, with
no sense of “phoning it in” for the contract. Vetra sounds like she’s always
looking for an opportunity, Liam has the sense of wonder the words imply, and
Gil the engineer is just someone who likes to take the piss. It’s a nice
difference from earlier games where a lot of the time characters could be quite
monotone.

Vetra Nyx, probably the best supporting character in the game

Combat:

The
main part of the game the development team wanted to show off beforehand was
the new combat system and after using it myself I can see why. While the games
have always had functional at best systems before here they finally look at
other third-person games to borrow from. Sprint for example is now mapped to
left stick like every game ever made instead of the a button for example.

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The
shooting itself feels fluid and fun rather than a fight with the controller
itself, easily able to pick out and lay down fire on the enemy. The shoulder
buttons have also been freed up from weapon and power selection to instead
using them like you once again would in other games.

Exploration:

Unlike
Dragon Age: Inquisition, which is how
I feared the game could end up like, resources are plentiful and maps aren’t
simply going round picking up plants. Most missions have a purpose that feels
more in the vein of Witcher 3 than
just fetch quests, all with at least some story behind them. So far this has
included solving a murder by looking for evidence and placing a memorial for
someone’s fallen family member.

While
some have criticised the new galaxy map system as being worse than Mass Effect 2 I really don’t get what
they’re on about. Here, instead of flying the ship across the map, you jump
from planet to planet within the system much like the first game expect there’s
a small custscene of you moving from planet to planet. In the end it basically
takes about the same time as flying between planets in the older games.

Story:

While
the story has major potential so far there have been the usual Bioware early
game pacing issues. After the first 30 minute or so introductory planet, which
is fast-paced and frantic, it quickly hits a long rut on the Nexus itself as
you talk to everyone and everything. Who doesn’t love all those nested
conversation statements.

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Clearly
it could pickup from here, with the first major planet being much better paced,
but so far get ready for Citadel introduction pain in the arse yet again.

All menus have this format, and refuse to work unless the image in the center is appearing like it should

Menus:

The
Bioware team have clearly attempted to improve their information system after
the original series of games. In the first game we all remember the utter wall
of items that got presented to you whenever you opened it and tried to interact.
Here however the solution goes too far the other way, with everything in
folders of folders of folders which can end up making that one piece of
information you wanted being hidden away.

Models:

This
is an interesting one and a subject of fierce debate since the first gameplay
footage and here’s my non-conclusive take on the subject. The aliens are all
fantastic without a doubt. All of them look real and fitting of their various
cultures set up since the first game. The humans on the other hand are a
completely different story.

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In
short they’re terrible. They have this weird skin shine and the hair is still
clearly pasted on with many of the styles. Also the designers have this awkward
tendency to slap makeup on every female human to the point they look like
clowns. Why my science technician is wearing bright pink lipstick and very
heavy blusher I have no idea but it just makes her look ridiculous.

Animation:

Yes
it’s true, the general animation of faces in this game isn’t great. Again this
is a mainly human issue in terms of lipsyncing that doesn’t really effect the
other races. Thankfully however it doesn’t really distract too much except for
the really bad one every now and then.

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Outside
of this there is one weird thing in that the Turians are a lot more bow legged
than last time, giving them an awkward squatting look from certain angles.

For a character introduced talking about her 60 page summary thesis on the quality of dirt the make-up is a strange combo

General
polish:

Much
like every modern Bioware game this game sadly has a number of polish issues.
While it’s easy to look past there are some that are just ridiculous. In one
case this saw Liam move his face clean through a box during a conversation and
carry on as if nothing happened.

In
the end Mass Effect: Andromeda is a
good or even possibly great game from my initial impressions. Despite initially
being sceptical of the project this very much feels like what Mass Effect 1 could be like if remade
today after what Bioware have learnt and lost over the last 10 years.